Sunday, September 28, 2008

The Choice is Yours


Forget Highways or Dieways. The choice here is Livers or Gizzards. We're in the Chicora-Cherokee neighborhood of North Charleston, SC, where choices are few and far between. This is the epicenter of the city's criminal culture and the habitat of its prey. It is a solid barrier to the regentrification which the city seeks.

The only source of cooked food in the immediate area comes from this place the name of which is uncertain. Such places tend to take on a decidedly generic image. Perhaps ownership shifts too frequently for any one name to long remain on the door. We just call it the Liver or Gizzards place.

It is unlikely that any four star restaurants are going to take the first step into this new market. Setting up shop here on Spruill Avenue is an adventure more of the quick and the dead rather than of profit and loss. The convenience store across the street has bars at every window and door. A half block south of here the soft drink vending machine lives in its own cage. Even the American Legion post is encamped behind a ten foot high chain link fence dressed in barbed wire. We are amazed that the traffic light has not been carried off in the night.

Note that the choice between liver or gizzards is made at separate windows where the goods are passed through protective bars behind which plywood baffles close between orders. We don't expect any of the downtown food service entrepreneurs to try to move in on this operation.

4 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

I drove through that very 'hood just yesterday on my way to visit a friend who lives further up. Even on Sunday morning the locale emanates a sense of menace. And nary a squad car or bike cop in sight......

8:02 AM  
Blogger Windviel said...

Well, the bike cops' bikes have been stolen and the squad cars are out generating revenue. That ultimate Dreadnought, the developer, will plow it all under when the market is right. Then the muggings will come from the tax man rather than the boys in this hood. You'd better put on that Kevlar sport coat next time your up this way. Thanks for dropping by.

11:04 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

have you replaced the tires on that machine yet ? - fw

8:44 PM  
Blogger Windviel said...

Well, the good folks at Jones Ford have replaced 3 of the 4 at no charge. Nails! It seems that they are not allowed to plug a Z rated tire...so they just replace them..free. We're keeping an eye on that 4th one. By the way, we dropped by a car show a while back and found a fully restored 57 Chevy wagon copper color. It really takes you back.

2:48 AM  

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